


Please

by toyhto



Series: In the Shadows [2]
Category: Black Sails
Genre: Angst, I don't know, M/M, Romance, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-14
Updated: 2020-10-14
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:28:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27014284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/toyhto/pseuds/toyhto
Summary: What happens the night after they attack Mr. Underhill's plantation and Billy refuses Flint's command.
Relationships: Billy Bones/Captain Flint | James McGraw
Series: In the Shadows [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1978000
Comments: 5
Kudos: 29





	Please

**Author's Note:**

> Never let canon get in the way of fanfiction. Or: I've been rewatching season 4 with my newly found Billy x Flint feelings and confused horror about what to make of it. But no problem at all. Apparently I like the Boss & Employer to Lovers turning into Friends to Lovers turning into Very Disappointed and Bitter and Betrayed-Feeling Enemies to Lovers kind of dynamic. [Here's my tumblr](http://toyhto.tumblr.com).

He only realised he was looking for Billy when Billy found him.  
  
“What’re you doing here?” he asked.  
  
“What’re _you_ doing here?” Billy asked, watching him. He could see two men standing in the distance, their hands on their guns in a gesture that was supposed to look subtle and non-threatening. They were his men. He couldn’t remember their names but recognised their faces.  
  
He looked the other way. It was far past midnight now, a dark, quiet night, the water beating the rocks on the shore in a steady rhythm, but hardly anything there to be seen. He should have been somewhere else. Anywhere else, really. Preferably in his own house. He should have been in bed, asleep, not walking around the shore like a madman, his body aching in places he didn’t remember hurting. But he supposed he didn’t remember everything that had happened in Mr. Underhill’s plantation. Most of it was a little blurred, and what was clear was the memory of Billy’s gun, aimed at his head.  
  
“No fucking idea,” he said to Billy and glanced at the men in the distance. “Are your men going to shoot me?”  
  
Billy glanced over his shoulder, then fixed his gaze back on Flint. He looked tired too, even in the dark, and his face was badly bruised. It’d look terrible in the morning. “No,” he said and then gestured at the men, who stood still for a second and then disappeared.  
  
Flint kept his eyes on Billy. Surely there was more to be worried about, but he just didn’t have it in him right now. Billy had a sword, too, and probably a pistol. He could kill Flint himself, if he wanted to. If he wanted it badly enough. But he didn’t look like he was going to, no, he just kept watching Flint with worried eyes. He had always been bad at concealing worry.  
  
“Your face,” Flint said and then bit his lip.  
  
Billy looked surprised. “My face?”  
  
“A nasty bruise.” Flint took a deep breath. “And I don’t like the beard.”  
  
“You don’t like the beard,” Billy said flatly, staring at him.  
  
“Yeah. No, I don’t like it. You looked better without it.”  
  
Billy breathed in.  
  
“I should be sleeping,” Flint went on before Billy could say anything. “My hip’s killing me. And my left knee. Didn’t realise it was that bad until I started walking.”  
  
“Why aren’t you sleeping, then?” Billy asked. He sounded older now, somehow, even though it couldn’t have been more than a few months since Flint had last seen him. And he had something new to his voice. A dark undertone. Maybe he was thinking about how he had tried to kill Flint just a couple of hours ago.  
  
“I don’t know,” Flint said, taking a step closer. _Fuck._ It was almost as if he had forgotten about how tall Billy was. He hadn’t realised he had forgotten anything. “Can’t stay still for some reason.”  
  
“You’re going to get yourself killed,” Billy said.  
  
“Yeah, well,” Flint said and turned to look at the sea. “Maybe you’re here to do the job. To finish what you started. Because I can’t understand why else we’d be talking here.”  
  
“You were looking for me.”  
  
“You were looking for me,” he said. “And probably not to apologise.”  
  
He remembered Billy’s smile.  
  
“Your men still in Underhill’s plantation?” he asked, ignoring the smile. Or he thought he was. It was too dark for Billy to properly read his face anyway.  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“So,” he said, “if you aren’t here to tell me you’re sorry you tried to kill me a couple of hours ago, I don’t know why you _are_ here.”  
  
“If you aren’t here to tell me you’re sorry for putting me into that position,” Billy said, the smile gone from his face, “I don’t know why we’re here.”  
  
Flint glanced at the sea and then took another step at Billy. In the beginning, it had taken him a while to realise he was really this simple. That he could want something so easily, without a decent reason to. He had barely remembered Billy’s name back then. And he had been busy, not looking for anything, not needing anything, except for Miranda’s company and to win an impossible war he was fighting for a dead man. But all it had taken had been a pretty man who was ridiculously tall and looked like he could hold Flint down if he wanted to, and also looked at Flint with the kind of respect he hadn’t earned.  
  
Billy hadn’t trusted him. Not really. He had realised that. He had accepted it and thought he could control it. Maybe this night had shown that he had been wrong. Or maybe he should have realised that a long time ago.  
  
He cleared his throat. “So,” he said.  
  
“So,” Billy said and then closed his mouth. But he didn’t move away, when Flint turned to face him. Apparently he was still letting Flint to do this. At first Flint hadn’t thought anything about it. He was the captain. He had more authority than Billy. If he wanted to fuck, it was him who should propose it.  
  
But later, he had been thinking that maybe Billy had known what he was doing from the start. Maybe he had realised that he was making Flint come to him, to ask for it, as if it was something he had and that Flint couldn’t do without. Which was bullshit. He didn’t want _that._ He didn’t want a tall pretty man to keep him down on the mattress in the dark hours of the night. He didn’t need hands on him, didn’t need to feel warm sweaty skin against his, didn’t need someone to hold him after.  
  
“You think someone’s going to come looking for you soon?” he asked, keeping his eyes on Billy’s. This was madness. But no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t make himself turn around and walk away. Not when he was this close to Billy. Not when he could see Billy’s fists clenching and unclenching, the flicker in Billy’s eyes as he waited, the way Billy’s throat jumped.  
  
“No one’s going to come looking for me,” Billy said. “They know I can handle you.”  
  
“You can?”  
  
Billy just stared at him.  
  
He nodded. “They know you’re with me, then?”  
  
“No,” Billy said. Now he sounded like he was about to laugh, but also a little breathless. Like he was in a rush. Well, that was good. It was good not to be the only lunatic here. “Of course not. Don’t be an idiot.”  
  
“Because they wouldn’t get it. You just tried to kill me, after all.”  
  
“I didn’t exactly want to,” Billy said and then frowned. “And I don’t understand this either.”  
  
“Yeah,” Flint said, even though he shouldn’t have. He had told himself that straight from the beginning: don’t show him weakness. Don’t bring in emotions. Don’t let yourself think that the two of you share anything besides an urge to fuck in the dark. No romance. You’re his captain, for fuck’s sake. And haven’t you had your share of unlucky love?  
  
So, maybe he had failed in that front, too. That much seemed obvious, since he was now standing on a deserted beach, hoping a man he had all the reasons to hate would be so kind and fuck him.  
  
“Billy,” he said slowly, and Billy flinched but didn’t stop looking at me. “Want to go somewhere?”  
  
“Not exactly,” Billy said. “Where would we go?”  
  
“I don’t know. But it’s not like we should just…”  
  
“What?”  
  
“Fuck here.”  
  
Billy just stared at him. Oh, god, how much he wanted this.  
  
“I kind of had an impression that you weren’t taking orders from me anymore.”  
  
Billy breathed deeply in and out. Flint watched him. Maybe Billy would choose to walk away from him. And wasn’t it funny that ever since they had stolen the rest of the Urca treasure and he had left Billy in Nassau and sailed away, he had told himself it had been just a fling. Just a fair. Just a convenient arrangement, because they both seemed to want it for whatever fucking reason. It wasn’t about _Billy._  
  
It was about Billy. He felt like if he didn’t have Billy’s hands on him in five minutes, something inside of him would break.  
  
“Just try it,” Billy said.  
  
  
**  
  
  
They had started it after the storm. It had been the wrong fucking time and place, both of them half-mad from dehydration and hunger, but maybe that was what had made it possible. Billy had lingered in his cabin one time after Silver had gone, and he had been able to take it for a while. Then he had walked too close to Billy, cornered him and, when he had been looking away and not protesting any of it, pushed a hand into his pants. He had wrapped his fingers around Billy’s cock and made him come in a minute, cleaned the mess himself, then tried to push Billy off before this would go any further. But he hadn’t managed. Billy had seen straight through him, which was maybe the scariest part. Billy had seen him and made him sit on his desk with his legs sprawled, telling Billy how much he needed this, how much he fucking needed Billy to finish him already, to stop playing with him, to just take him.  
  
Later, he had thought it had been just words. He hadn’t been thinking clearly. Surely Billy had realised that. They had gotten each other off once but wouldn’t do it again, not with a ship full of men scared of almost certain death. Not with their minds busy with other things, like, managing the impossible situation.  
  
Two days later, Billy had knocked on his door early in the morning and hovered at his face until he had kissed the man. It had been a mistake. Then he had kissed Billy again. Then he had made Billy take off his trousers and pants and push two fingers into him with nothing but spit to ease the way. And then, after a small eternity, he had come with Billy’s hand on his cock and Billy’s fingers in his ass and with grim knowledge that there was no way he would stop asking for this for as long as Billy was willing to give it to him.  
  
It was a long time since he had last fucked a man. Or let a man fuck him, to be precise. He didn’t remember what to do. He didn’t remember how to take it. And he had absolutely no chance at not letting it get into him. Big hands holding him down, breaths on his neck, the smell of sweat, coarse hair brushing against his ass, a cock inside him, the relentless rhythm of someone fucking him into the mattress, the bliss that came after, fingers stroking his hair -  
  
Sometimes he felt he slipped out of his mind and thought for a second it was Thomas.  
  
He didn’t have a chance.  
  
“I had someone once,” he said now, and everything stopped. He could hear his own breathing, could feel his heart pounding in his throat, and the trembling that was slowly starting to build. Billy still had his hands on his hips and he was holding onto him tightly enough to bruise, which was good, except that he would have to make sure no wrong person would see the marks. Billy’s dick was in his hole, pushing as far as it would go, but still for now.  
  
“What?” Billy asked.  
  
What an awful time to start this conversation. “A man,” Flint said, closing his eyes. He was facing the ground anyway. His knees were rubbing against the sand. “Someone I loved.”  
  
“You loved a man,” Billy said. He didn’t sound entirely calm right now.  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“And you’re telling me this… why?”  
  
“I don’t know,” Flint said. His knees were trembling. “So you know what you’re dealing with me.”  
  
Billy was quiet for a second. “Why the hell would you want me to know what I’m dealing with?”  
  
“No idea,” Flint said. Billy shifted against his back and his dick brushed against one specific spot inside him. Oh, _shit._ “Billy –“  
  
“I thought this was just fucking.”  
  
“It is,” Flint said and bit his lip. He had known for a long time that he had a death wish of some sort. But this was a great fucking time for it to appear. “Billy, I need you to get your hand on my cock or –“  
  
Billy pulled out, pushed into him once with force and then stopped again. “Because what else could it be?”  
  
“Now’s not the time,” he said, trying to breathe. “Billy, for fuck’s sake, can’t you just –“  
  
“You want nothing from me,” Billy said, fucked into him a few times and then slowed down, barely moving. “Nothing except this for some fucking reason. I don’t know why. It’s not like you ever trusted me.”  
  
“I can’t trust people. Billy –“  
  
“I don’t think you even respect me,” Billy said, “not really. I thought you were lonely and wanted someone and I just happened to be there. Or maybe you wanted someone bigger than yourself and there wasn’t too many choices. And now we’re fucking for the first time in ages and you stop me to tell me that you were in love with a man once.”  
  
“I didn’t mean to _stop_ you _._ I just –“  
  
“I can’t understand why you’d tell me that,” Billy said and then started to fuck him again so suddenly he almost fell on his face, but Billy grabbed his shoulder and pulled him back. He managed to get his elbow against the ground. Everything in him was hurting in more than one way. He didn’t know what he was doing. He didn’t know anything. He just wanted to… just wanted to…  
  
“He loved me too.”  
  
“ _Fucking hell_ ,” Billy said and slammed into him with a force that made his elbow give out. He tasted the sand. Billy’s dick was still in his arse, what a bloody fucking miracle, and most of Billy’s weight was on him, which shouldn’t have been ideal but it was. He tried to breathe but he had his face against the ground. God, he was tired. He was so fucking tired and there was no one to hold him, not anymore, not since he had lost Miranda. He had a sickening feeling that maybe he had only realised how badly he needed Miranda once he had lost her. That kind of a mistake was so easy to make. And now the only person whom he could let close enough to comfort him was Billy Bones for some fucking reason. What a disaster. What a truly fucking disaster.  
  
“Flint,” Billy said, pulled out of him and rolled him onto his back. His dick was still hard, but there was no way he was going to get back on his elbows and knees. “I don’t know what you’re trying to say to me.”  
  
“I’m not trying to say anything,” he told Billy. “Absolutely not.” He took a deep breath. He was still Billy’s captain, whether Billy remembered it or not. “Now, get your fucking finger into my arse and get me off.”  
  
Billy looked at him for a few seconds, then sighed and obeyed. He was so relieved he couldn’t probably keep it from showing on his face. But he was close to coming already, and Billy’s finger in his hole wasn’t nearly enough and also exactly what he needed. Clearly Billy remembered what to do to him. He didn’t have to give more instructions, no, he just lay back and looked at the stars and said a few things he would regret later, but nothing about love. Only how much he had missed this. How much he had missed Billy’s hands. How he needed Billy to fucking take him already. _Please._ And Billy tightened the grip on his cock but took all the time in the fucking world to finish him, and when he finally came, he didn’t know what he was saying anymore.  
  
Later, he made Billy lie back on the ground and took Billy’s cock in his hand. Billy was quiet all the way through it.  
  
  
**  
  
  
“How did it end?”  
  
He turned to look at Billy. They had been sitting on the ground for maybe ten minutes and he had been wondering which one of them would be the first to get up and leave. There was no reason to linger. “Badly,” he said.  
  
“How badly?”  
  
He took a deep breath. “He died.” _Bloody hell._ “And I ended up in here.”  
  
Billy was quiet for a moment. The night was only getting darker, and Flint’s left knee felt like maybe it wouldn’t hold his weight once he tried to walk back to the house.  
  
“I don’t suppose we’re going to end this,” Billy said finally.  
  
“No.”  
  
“I can’t see how we can keep this on, either.”  
  
“Yeah. No, me neither.”  
  
“We can’t just, I don’t know, walk around on the beach at night and hope we bump into each other and no one will notice.”  
  
“Absolutely not.”  
  
“And we’ve got a few tiny disagreements. Like, I really thought for a second today that I’d kill you today.”  
  
“Yeah, me too.”  
  
“So, it’d be crazy to think that there’s some kind of feelings involved.”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“Even though you claim that you’re… capable.”  
  
Flint bit his lip a bit too hard and then glanced at Billy. “You thought I wasn’t?”  
  
“You kind of make it seem you don’t care for anything or anyone,” Billy said surprisingly gently.  
  
“Well, I do.”  
  
“You do –“  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“You loved her, too. Mrs. Barlow.”  
  
Flint looked away.  
  
“And Mr. Gates.” Billy paused. “I’m never forgiving you, by the way.”  
  
“I don’t expect you to.”  
  
“I don’t know why we’re having this conversation,” Billy said. Flint looked at him. He was sitting straight, his arms wrapped around his knees in almost protective gesture, his eyes on Flint as if he was once again ready to take whatever orders Flint gave him. Despite not trusting him. Despite not _liking_ him.  
  
“I don’t expect you to,” Flint said. _God_ , he sounded soft. He cleared his throat. “We should get the fuck away from here. Someone’s going to find us sooner or later.”  
  
“Yeah,” Billy said but didn’t move.  
  
“I meant it,” Flint said and stood up. It was going to be a long walk back to the house. Apparently he was getting old. “I don’t expect anything from you. Except maybe this. Whatever this is.”  
  
“You expect me to… put you on your knees and elbows and fuck you. Once in a while. When you tell me to.”  
  
He pulled his shoulders back. His joints cracked. “Yes.”  
  
“It’s not like I don’t like it.”  
  
He almost laughed. “Yeah. I _know._ ” He nodded to Billy and started walking across the cliffs to the path that would eventually take him back to the house. He had been gone for far too long anyway.  
  
He managed something like twenty steps before Billy spoke up. “I care about some people, too. But I’m not sure if you’re worth it.”  
  
He took a deep breath. He could turn back. He could walk to Billy and wait as Billy would stand up. Billy would have done that. Billy would have done a lot of things for him, he was sure of that. After everything, Billy still listened to him. He could make Billy kiss him and embrace him and hold him near as if they were lovers and not just men who sometimes fucked. For a moment, he could have everything. And fucking hell how badly he wanted it.  
  
“Of course I’m not worth it,” he said and walked away.


End file.
